


Intermission

by ziskandra



Series: Refraction [1]
Category: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (TV)
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, Greg POV, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:14:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26521228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ziskandra/pseuds/ziskandra
Summary: Recently divorced Audra Levine visits West Covina to provide moral support during her frenemy’s open mic night.Greg has always had a type.
Relationships: Audra Levine/Greg Serrano
Series: Refraction [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1977016
Comments: 8
Kudos: 10
Collections: Het Swap Exchange 2020





	Intermission

**Author's Note:**

  * For [innie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/innie/gifts).



It’s during intermission at the open mic night that Greg notices the mysterious stranger in the corner of the room. He can tell she’s not from around here. There’s pros and cons to growing up in a place like West Covina. For example, pro: knowing everybody in town. But also, con: knowing everybody in town. Well, knowing the relevant people, anyway: those with shared hobbies; those who’d graduated high school in the same year; those who had drank at the same places he had, back when he’d been drinking. Now days, he’s focused more on his friends and his family and the employees and clientele of the restaurant, but the question remains.

He’s never seen this woman before in his life, so what is she doing at the open mic night?

She doesn’t seem like the type to enjoy comedy, and she’s dressed too sharply to be from one of the neighboring towns. Honestly, nothing about the crisp lines of her ‘casual’ pantsuit scream California to him. She could give Valencia a run for her money in the fashion department without even batting an eye.

Then she opens her mouth and he finds the answer he’s been seeking all along, realization sinking in the pit of his stomach like a stone.

New York. She’s from New York. What was with him and New Yorkers? Despite everything he had been through in the last few years, he wasn’t sure if it was a relief or a disappointment that his taste in women hadn’t changed any.

“Uh, hello?” The woman’s grin is stretched tight across her face, crinkling the corners of her eyes in a way that makes her look stressed instead of happy. “Can I help you?” As Greg fumbles for an answer, she tilts her head to the side, regarding him with a cool glance. He feels transparent, like she can see straight through him. “You’re staring.”

He laughs, an awkward attempt to diffuse the tension. Rolling his shoulders, he answers, “Guilty as charged.” Can he be blamed, though? He decides that thought is better off kept to himself. “You’re not from around here, are you?”

The woman ducks her head, and although her mouth tightens and her lips narrow, Greg can’t help but notice she seems pleased by his observation.

“Well, obviously,” she says, with a sidelong glance towards the stage. There’s a chessboard and chairs being carried to the center. Goodie. Greg can’t wait to see what _that’s_ about. He also wants to ask the woman why it’s so obvious she’s from out of town, but it would be disingenuous to pretend he hadn’t noticed. “I’m here to support… a friend?”

Greg can’t help but raise his eyebrows at the way the women’s intonation creeps upwards at the end of the sentence, more query than statement. “Well, are you or not?”

“Moral support,” the woman decides with an assertive nod of the head, lips curling at the corners of her mouth. This smile is more genuine, Greg realizes. She’s got dimples. It’s kinda cute.

“So, which one’s your friend?” Greg asks; it takes all his self-restraint not to accompany his question with air quotes, but he doesn’t stop himself from clarifying, “Or not friend.” He lifts his hands in mock resignation. “No judgement.” Part of him hopes she’ll tell him what the deal is with the chessboard. Greg’s never been a fan of chess jokes. They’ve always been too black and white ( _hah, nailed it!)_.

“Oh,” the woman starts, glancing down at her hands. Whatever she’d been drinking, her glass is empty. “She’s already been on.” Her forehead creases. “Rebecca Bunch. You know her, right?”

Of course. _Of course_. Rebecca Nora Bunch, who had set herself upon West Covina almost four years ago like the city’s pertinacious personal cyclone, upending the lives of everybody who crossed her path with no recourse or regard for what had come before. The worst part is that he doesn’t even regret it: he wouldn’t be who he is today if he’d never met Rebecca. But seeing her on that stage, a year to the day after she’d been slated to make her life’s most important decision, had allowed Greg to finally relinquish the torch he’d carried for her after all this time. Rebecca was right: they had all found happiness in their own way, and it was time for Greg to look forward to the future and not back at the past.

The woman is still staring at him and he owes her an answer. He wets his lips. “You were here for her set,” he says in acknowledgement of what they both know. He had been one of Rebecca’s suitors, once upon a time. “But to make it official…” He offers the woman a hand to shake. “Greg Serrano, titular proprietor of _Serrano’s_.” Maybe he and his dad could have come up with a more creative name, but hey, it’s tradition. Besides, the place basically advertises itself.

If the woman thinks the name is stupid, she doesn’t show it, instead accepting his hand in her smaller one; her skin is soft and smooth and well-moisturized, the sort that has never known any sort of hard labor. Not that Greg has many illusions about being the physical type himself, but he also doesn’t _exfoliate_ (whatever that means).

“Audra Levine, junior partner at Sampson & Saunders,” the woman – Audra – answers in response. The way she draws out her full name and job title makes her sound like a comic book villain, which is both much cooler than a restaurateur and also a bit terrifying, in a frustratingly sexy sort of way.

He releases Audra’s hand and finds himself mourning the loss. God, it’s been way too long since he’s had any sort of meaningful physical contact if he’s getting this way about a handshake with a stranger. A suspiciously attractive stranger, but still. Nonetheless, the introduction allows the pieces of the puzzle to fall into place. Rebecca hadn’t talked much about her time in New York when they had been together, but neither had Greg reflected much upon West Covina when he had left. Maybe it was like that no matter where one was born: it was part of the human condition to yearn to be somewhere else, someone else. Maybe leaving was the only way Greg had learned that _home_ was where he’d belonged all along. 

“You’ve known her a long time, then,” he notes, head turning back towards the stage even though Rebecca’s no longer sitting there, most likely among the throng of people sitting closer towards the front of the room, by Paula’s side.

Audra’s smile tightens, and for a moment it looks as though she might not deign to answer. She glances down briefly at her empty glass before looking back up, locking eyes with Greg. “You could say that. Most our lives, actually.”

The lights in the room dim, a warning the intermission is almost over. Greg’s gaze drops to Audra’s empty glass and drifts over to the bar. He makes an impulse decision. “Can I get you another drink?”

She laughs that awkward laugh women often make when they don’t know how to reject an offer, but it’s not for the reason he’s expecting. “It’s just soda. I’m not drinking right now.”

The unnecessary explanation fills Greg with a surge of affection for the woman. He too has struggled with fending off offers of unwanted alcohol, booze an implicit baseline of so many adult interactions. “I’m not either,” he tells her, and the truth tumbles out of him before he can quite stop himself. Not that he’s been hiding it, it’s just that everybody already _knows_. “I’m three years sober.” He averts his gaze, still uncomfortable with the look on people’s faces when he tells them that. That he’s strong, that he’s brave, that he’s … _whatever_. He only did what he needed to do to get his shit together, in order to grasp the chance to be happy. Still not quite looking at Audra, he asks, “Another soda, then?”

“Yes, please.” Audra agrees more easily than Greg had expected, and when he chances a look at her face, he’s delighted to discover she’s smiling that smile again, the real one, with the dimples in her cheeks.

*

They find themselves a table together in the corner of the room and they get to talking between the sets: that’s the thing about small community shows like this, Audra says, half complaint, half admiration. They’re not as streamlined as big events. There’s just so much _downtime_.

By the time the chessboard comedian comes and goes, leaving a series of bad jokes and the questionable idea of ‘strip chess’ in their heads (of course it’s a sex thing, it’s always a sex thing), Greg has learnt several fun facts about Audra. She’s recently divorced, had given birth to triplets a year and a half ago (that’s why she’s not drinking, she’s still pumping milk, out of guilt and obligation for wanting to be a good mother, despite her choices), and that she and Rebecca were hyper-competitive growing up. She laughs between slow, steady sips of her soda. “She didn’t really invite me here,” Audra explains. “Well, not personally. Unless a Facebook event counts. I figured she was just showing off, but…” As she trails off, her gaze dims, grows more wistful. “She’s happy. I’m happy for her. I want that for myself one day.”

“You’re heading in the right direction,” he tells her, expanding upon it with a bit of his own story, about how he’d had to hit rock bottom before rebuilding his life, bit-by-bit. He knows nobody plans to be a divorced mother-of-three by thirty, but that doesn’t mean she’s done anything wrong, that she can’t find her happiness one day. Better to admit things aren’t working and try again somewhere new than to keep trying to keep up the same old pretenses, suffocating under the weight of everyone you’d ever known, everything you’d ever hope you’d become, but didn’t.

He’d know.

Audra looks at him gratefully and he can only hope that some of his advice has hit its mark. Truth be told, despite everything, he’s still only making this up as he goes along.

As it turns out, chessboard man had been the penultimate act of the night. There are only two reasons why Greg hasn’t left already. Firstly, it would be rude, and the act wouldn’t go unnoticed in a place like West Covina, but more importantly, he finds himself genuinely enjoying Audra’s company. He can feel her fidgeting next to him throughout the final set; he sympathizes because there’s only so many times one can watch a person pretend to fall over.

She nudges him in the side with her hip, shifting some of her weight gently on his chair as she leans up to whisper into his ear. “If you could handle Bunch,” she says, “then you can handle me.”

He’s not even sure what that _means_ but he feels the sides of his face heat up all the same. What he is certain of is that she’s flirting with him, and that he doesn’t hate it. Well, okay, that’s an understatement. He enjoys it, in fact. It’s been so long since he’s received this sort of attention. Or any sort of attention, really.

Before he knows it, the night is over before it’s truly even begun. Greg knows his friends are probably wondering where he’s gone but he can’t bring himself to care. They know how to find him if they really want; his cell phone is even fully charged for once. “I should get going,” Audra says, pulling out her own cell: the latest iPhone. _Of course_. Manicured fingers tap against the screen as she grumbles, “I can’t believe this place only has Uber and Lyft.”

Greg can’t resist the opportunity to make a joke. “Back in my day,” he says, “we just stumbled home after a big night out.”

Audra scoffs, but when her eyes crease this time, Greg can see her genuine amusement written on her face. “You’d never survive in New York City,” she remarks fondly, and Greg decides to take that as a compliment. Considers telling her so, but then she interrupts his thought process with an invitation. “Wait with me?” she asks, and he’d be a sucker to say _no_.

*

“I enjoyed talking with you,” Audra says as they huddle together on the sidewalk, exposed skin pebbling in the cool winter breeze. 

“What’s with the tone of surprise?” Greg asks, nudging her elbow with his own. He’s smiling, he realizes, he’s been smiling all night. He’s enjoyed talking with Audra, too.

“You made me feel like a person again,” she confesses as she closes in towards him. He could wrap his arms around her shoulders, if he wanted to.

Greg frowns. “You should always feel like a person, Audra.”

Audra crosses her arms over her chest, her own smile turning sadder as she considers something that’s both off in the middle distance but at the forefront of her own mind. “Try saying that when you have kids,” she remarks softly.

A nearby car slows down as it approaches them. Audra’s ride is here. He doesn’t want her to leave, but there’s no other option, no other way this night is ending, unless..? He leans in to give her a hug goodbye, and he makes one last impulse decision for the night. Or maybe she does. Because truth be told he doesn’t know who initiated it, just that he’s kissing Audra and she’s kissing him back. Her lips are warm and soft against his own; they fit together better than he could have anticipated. It's over almost as quickly as it had begun. Audra whispers one last thank you against his ear before slipping into the car, leaving Greg mouthing his goodbyes as the vehicle disappears into the distance.

In his pocket, his phone chimes with a new notification.

_Audra Levine has sent you a friend request on Facebook._


End file.
